Issue Editorial: In Quest of a definition of Motherhood

By Paromita Sengupta

The trappings of motherhood are so powerful that even in today’s hi-tech neoteric world many women across the globe believe that biological motherhood is the ultimate goal of their life. They acquiesce to drain their time, energy and money and put themselves at huge health risks from repeated hormonal treatments and surgery to become pregnant and to be able to give birth. My interest in the area of motherhood studies was triggered by certain personal experiences – one of which was that of seeing a friend stubbornly determined to conceive at any cost. She went through 19 cycles of IUI (IntraUterine Insemination) which failed, and then went onto the more expensive as well as dangerous IVFs (In Vitro Fertilisation, also popularly known as Test Tube Baby Method). She conceived and gave birth to a girl on her thirteenth IVF. This woman intrigues me. I can still hear her words echo in my head, “I will give birth. At any cost.”

Patriarchy has been instrumental in crafting the supermom – a postmodern product who is continually trying to excel in her role as a mother and also often trying to balance it with the pressures of a job. The postmodern supermom, in trying to prove herself the best at whatever she does, is a victim of her own self-image.  On the other end of the spectrum of motherhood lies the unwelcome, socially unsanctioned mother who has to be as much shadowy about her motherhood as the supermom is exuberant about it. For motherhood, one of the grandest constructions of human society and patriarchy, is venerable and acceptable only when it conforms to certain socially accepted norms and fulfils the essential function of propagating and nurturing the wanted, the healthy, the normative. The moment it steps outside the threshold, it is not only not tolerated, it is squished and throttled. So often, women who give birth outside social sanction, are outcastes. They are criminalised and have little option other than to hide/ abandon/ give up/away what they have produced. Their produce – a human baby, mind you – is then often discovered, often in an endangered state, in some jungle, or some garbage dump, and if the baby is ‘lucky’ (note the irony) to be discovered by some “good samaritan”, it is handed over to the administration, police, etc. The same community, which is itself responsible for such debacles, then clicks its collective tongue in dismay and morals come tumbling out of its giant two-faced mouth. The dismal irony is that most of us are totally unaware of our collective failure as a community – the failure to guarantee women the right to consensual motherhood, to ensure pregnant woman proper choices and support, and to vouchsafe the hapless newborn the most basic of all rights – the right to life, leave alone that of a dignified one. The same community which dehumanises a married woman who is unable to conceive, turns its face away from the millions of babies in need of a home.

The last few decades have seen an upsurge in self-help books on motherhood and parenting by doctors/ psychologists/ counsellors. These books partially come from the market demand of course, thereby suggesting that some women/ mothers/ would be mothers need psychological help on parenting/mothering, which in turn suggests that “motherhood” is no longer a taken that may be identified as an essential unproblematic function of womanhood/ femininity. The rise of feminism and the increasing participation of women outside the domestic sphere are probably two of the most basic causes that have contributed to the rising ambivalence towards mothering/ motherhood and towards the questioning of this institution that is as old as human life itself. Medical Science, social pressures, psychological conditioning, ideological constructions that hail motherhood as sacred, saintly, and heroic and exalt its “sacrifices”, are but some of the instruments that patriarchy has been using to impose motherhood as an essential identity of womanhood. So, when the contemporary woman doubts and questions this sacrosanct institution which is supposed to be her primordial “instinct”, or tries to exert a “choice”, there comes along a book that acknowledges the challenges of modern motherhood, but somehow ends up justifying and approbating it all the more. In the book The Birth of a Mother: How the Motherhood Experience Changes You Forever, psychiatrist Daniel N. Stern allies forces with paediatrician and child psychiatrist Nadia Bruschweiler-Stern and journalist Alison Freeland to paint a wonderfully evocative picture of the psychology of motherhood. At the heart of The Birth of a Mother is an arresting premise: Just as a baby develops physically in utero and after birth, so a mother is born psychologically in the many months that precede and follow the birth of her baby. The authors of this book claim that they have based their conclusions of such a transformation on hundreds of interviews with new mothers and decades of clinical experience. This book, like many others, seals the argument in favour of motherhood as an ultimately rewarding experience – as a reward in itself. It is this standardised notion of a “magical”, “spiritual”, “idyllic” and “transformative” construction of biological motherhood and the concept of the birth of the mother that is problematic.

Is it really possible to put forward a linear, consistent definition of maternity, motherhood and mothering? What or who is a mother? We cannot certainly be satisfied with the limitations of the description “the female parent of a child.” And when is the mother born? If motherhood is a psychological/ spiritual experience, how can we accept that the mother is born at the moment of conception, gestation or parturition?

Motherhood as an institution is implicated in broader concerns such as the formation of female identity and the subject of gender differences in a society that is and has been overtly patriarchal. As a topic of inquiry, Motherhood intrudes dangerously into a space that is private, making it almost impossible to draw boundaries between the scholarly concern and the personal experience. Though invasive, this kind of an infringement could well demonstrate how matters of real experience might be made into valid subjects of academic enquiry. Personal essays such as those by Kamla Bhasin, Anuradha Mazumdar, Antara Mukherjee and Chandrakala Ghosh and poems by Paulami Sengupta enrich this edition by coming from a personal space.

Famous mother figures in mythology, history, literature and other art forms have from time to time shaped, validated, questioned or upset the ideological notions of motherhood. The grand narrative of a glorious, self-sacrificing motherhood has been countered in mythology and literature as well as through history. Reference points in the discourse of motherhood are famous mother figures and constructions of motherhood in Literature, Mythology, Religion and History – Jocasta, Clytemnestra, Penelope, Medea, the paradox inherent in the concept of Virgin Mother Mary, Karna-Kunti and Yashoda-Krishna relationship in the Mahabharata, Rani Lakshmi bai of Jhansi with her infant son tied behind her as she fights on horseback, Lady Macbeth’s “un-motherliness”, Brecht’s Mother Courage, Gorky’s Nilovna, Queen Victoria as a mother figure, Synge’s Maurya, the nationalist project of Bharat Mata-Vande Mataram, Mother India (Indian film), Mahasweta Devi’s Jashoda (“Breast Giver”) and Mother of 1084 are but few of these.

Some of the questions that prompted this issue are: Is motherhood physiological necessity, a biological consequence, an emotional urge or is it a social construct? When, how and why does motherhood become a function of feminine identity? Is motherhood always heroic and adulation worthy? Is motherhood always voluntary? When does motherhood become a compulsion? And, when it does, what are the psychological and social consequences of unwanted/ forced motherhood? What are the socially accepted norms of motherhood? I haven’t found answers, but I do feel that a) Biological Motherhood should be an option/ choice b) Motherhood is essentially psychic, emotional, spiritual and cognitive. Examining the constructions of motherhood in human history and society, time has perhaps come to attempt to detonate the motherhood bomb from within.

Twentieth century western feminists had long ago initiated the process of dislodging biological motherhood from the pedestal on which patriarchy had so conveniently perched it. Their struggle for women’s rights included an effort to dis-equate motherhood from womanhood/ femininity. In India, where middle class women did not have to fight for voting rights or the right to education, patriarchy has been functioning at various levels in various domains, ranging from the subtle to the very gross. One of these domains is that of motherhood. Simone de Beauvoir famously said that a woman reaches her physiological destination when she becomes a mother; she urged women to learn to extract themselves from this conspiracy of nature to make her a slave to her body. Beauvoir, like the numerous feminists after her, pointed out how mythology, history, and social structures all collaborate with nature to enslave the woman to her body. The constructions of motherhood in mythology, history, and social structures may be detonated from within because these structures themselves contain the seeds of their own destruction. History, Mythology, Religion and Social Constructs abound in examples which will prove that motherhood has been wrongly constructed as a monolith of love and sacrifice, innate in all women, the epitome of whose life is motherhood. Real life contemporary examples, gleaned from personal experiences and newspaper reports, would only further ascertain the same. This mismatch between the patriarchal fantasy of motherhood (to which many women faithfully subscribe) with the heuristic reality raises the question: Is motherhood really misunderstood and therefore misrepresented? But evidence suggests otherwise. Evidence suggests that elevating motherhood to unnatural heights is a deliberate patriarchal ploy to limit women, to restrict and check their potentials. Many women in the last few decades did certainly take up the motherhood challenge and respond to it by attempting to push through the limits of what social norms suggest as constituting “good” motherhood. Women have jostled their careers with motherhood, and in trying to excel in both, often ended up with the unfounded guilt and regret that they are doing complete justice to none.

The idea that all women may not want to be mothers is not certainly a new idea. Yet it is not just not acceptable but regarded as unnatural and blasphemous. I would like to add to that idea by suggesting that between a woman and a mother may lie a “birther”. A woman who gives birth must not immediately be labelled a mother. It is important to understand that just because a woman’s body is physiologically adapted to bear a child, motherhood in humans (as opposed to the purely natural world of animals) is implicated in broader concerns of sociological significance. Motherhood is not psychologically innate in all women and not all women must necessarily and willingly choose to be pregnant/ give birth or mother a child.^[1] Those who don’t may yet become pregnant either in an unplanned manner, or due to social/ family pressures or due to coercion such as rape: these are however some possibilities, there must be many more. Of those women who become pregnant unwillingly, many would have to carry their pregnancy to full term due to lack of awareness, options, agency. Physically giving birth, these women still remain non-consensual mothers.^[2] Some give up their babies for adoption, some simply try to dispose them,^[3] and some keep the babies for lack of any other option. In the grand narrative of motherhood, the voices/ stories/ predicaments of the women who are mothers, but not by choice, urgently need to find space. It has to be understood that birthing is not equivalent to motherhood. The stories, voices, and experience of women who give birth without wanting or choosing to do so, needs to enter the motherhood discourse. So also does the discourse of motherhood outside socially accepted norms. The latter would include issues such as non-consensual pregnancy and birthing, abortion, infanticide, abandonment and surrender of infants and children. On the other side of the threshold of non-consensual pregnancy and birthing stand adoptive mothers who choose motherhood with or without biological challenges either ignoring the biology part of it or transcending it. Adoptive motherhood is born of a psychical bond that is so overpowering that it completely eclipses all received notions about ‘blood relation’, ‘pull of DNA’, etc. Also, it is a way more human and logical choice given the condition in which human beings have landed themselves today – millions of babies are in need of a home. However, it is almost like a nationalist and medical project to make women of a certain socio-economic class biologically reproduce, bear children and multiply their kind, rather than be human and extend their warmth to those in need. As Barsha Mondal’s essay explores – the  adoptive mother is so often seen/ imagined as a witch/ kidnapper rather than a ‘real’ mother. However, there are some positive renderings as well, as brought out in the articles by Prithvijit Sinha, Ramsha Aveen and Amarinder Gill.

The whole illogical argument behind the insanely priced artificial reproductive techniques escapes most women who are made to feel insignificant and incomplete until they physically give birth. Apart from draining money, these processes also drain emotions, energy and our spirituality. They drain our belief in god and in good. They make us inhuman and illogical. Why? Because humanity would have suggested that man should do his bit to take care of man and logic would support spending resources wisely. It would have argued that one should consider other ways of creating families than lab-based methods. It would have argued that DNA cannot be the only carrier of parenthood. It would have drilled some sense into innumerable “infertile” couples who would then stop seeing themselves in binaries as either “fertile” or “barren”/”infertile” and start seeing the wonderful opportunities that life has in store for each of us and realise that life does not either stop at or begin from the simple physical act of reproduction.

Life has more to it than biological processes which have to be imitated in laboratories to produce photocopy babies. If motherhood is an instinct or feeling, it certainly cannot be tied down to physical bindings. If motherhood is an urge, it should certainly have the power to transcend narrow limits of physicality. But those who make millions out of the fertility industry, they successfully construct limited notions of motherhood, sell fake images of happy healthy babies in lovely toothless smiles in the arms of counterfeit mothers, and lure prospective parents into the trap of repeated procedures of artificial reproductive techniques.

When the world is troubled with poverty and terrorism, by what perverse logic can biological motherhood be erected as the ultimate goal of human life? When millions of children world over are in need of families, what sense is there in creating designer laboratory babies? Is it so urgent and important to reproduce and replicate the genotype, at any cost? If motherhood is an instinct that has to be heeded to, isn’t it an insane funny paradox that motherhood must be limited to the narrow boundaries of one’s own biological product? Why, in the first place, must all women strive to be biological mothers? Why can’t life have any other purpose? Why is motherhood constructed as the epitome of womanhood? Yes, motherhood is transformative, but no, biological motherhood is not essential. Yes, motherhood is rewarding, but no, biological motherhood does not define a woman. Yes, motherhood may or may not be a choice, but no, biology has nothing to do with it. And yes, motherhood may be a function of our lives, but no, it is certainly not limited to the physical birthing. We may or may not be mothers at all. If we choose to be mothers, we may or may not choose the biological way. And why should adoption be limited as an option only for “infertile” couples? Why should couples only seek “healthy” babies? What about those babies who are born with physical/ mental disability and thereby abandoned? Don’t they deserve a home? Can’t we really afford a little more love, some more humanity?

For all adoptive parents, the overbearing urge in adopting a child comes mostly from within; adoption originates from the desire to nurture, to be a parent and never really from any sense of compassion/ social obligation/ welfare. However, even in wanting to become parents, some prospective parents want to “choose” children who are healthy, and small babies/infants. Older children and challenged children do not find many takers. A little introspection will tell us that our “privilege” in being born as a healthy person is but a matter of “luck”. Before we call the children, who have been adopted “lucky”, let us remember that it is our own “luck” and privilege that we have been born in a certain way in a certain circumstance and in a given family. One slight twist of fate/ coincidence/ chance could have seen us elsewhere and otherwise. Let us remember the first lessons we learnt as kids and the first things we as parents would like to teach ours: to be kind, to be not greedy, to respect life, to sort things out, to be selfless, and to share. Share in the true sense of the word. The moment we learn to share our selves with the world around us, the world will be a better place. If we choose to accept more lives as part of our life, it is we who will be truly blessed. Adoption is unconditional love, it is that bliss which enables adults to see the reflection of their own hearts in the smiling eyes of the young, and it is a greatly rewarding and deeply spiritual experience. Let us stop tagging the word “adopted” as an adjective each and every time to refer to the lovely children, using it as an identifier. Let us stop calling the children “lucky” and instead realise how blessed the people feel who make this wonderful choice.

Adoption creates families – families crafted with pure love, families of amazing people who have the spark of the infinite in them because they chose not to be defined by the narrow limits of flesh and blood, families of loving people who transcended constricted, suffocating definitions of what it means to be family.

The world would indeed be a beautiful place if privileged people would have the chance and the heart to adopt families and not just children. The dream of the whole world as one community, the vision of one world, one family, may be too utopian, but there is no harm in dreaming the next best dream: the dream of a world where every existing child has a mother, a world where mothering is recognized as a psychological state and not as a physical activity. The mind asks a lot of questions but there are no definite answers. The existing construct of a “standard” motherhood needs to be dismantled and in its place can we imagine a plurality of possible motherhoods and motherings and mothers? Can we imagine a million kinds of mothers, can we imagine that every person will be able to choose his/her need for any kind of motherhood. How wonderful would it be if every baby who is already born finds a mother and that mother is not necessarily female. Perhaps someday the human community will function as a community should – displaying basic empathy for a fellow human being. Perhaps. Someday. If we could expand our hearts, definitions would perforce expand themselves.

Photo: Illustration Mother & Child (Abstract Art) – Fritz Stuckenberg by Nook Vintage Archive

^[1] I use “mother” as a verb here. One may “mother” a child without giving birth physically. Onemay not choose motherhood at all, physically or otherwise.

^[2] I would like to distinguish between ‘birther’ and ‘mother’. Giving birth is a physical activity; becoming a mother is a psychological process. All birthers are not necessarily mothers and vice-versa.

^[3] Newspaper reports of new-born abandoned babies, especially girl-children, found in garbage bins, jungles are not uncommon in India.

Issue Editor:
Paromita Sengupta, PhD, English is an academic, author, translator with a keen interest in independent filmmaking. Her book publications include an edition of The Persecuted, (the first drama to be written in the English language by an Indian, Revd. K. M. Banerjea), Bimukta (published by Eka, Westland Amazon in March 2020), a Bengali translation of The Liberation of Sita, a Sahitya Akademi Award winning collection of short stories by Volga. Paromita’s translation of Dalit writer Sharan Kumar Limbale’s novel Sanatan, is currently under publication process from Penguin. At present, Paromita lives in Limerick, Ireland, and is working as Director of Studies in Griffith College Limerick.

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